Those who are attached to traditions had a difficult Prinsjesdag. The Golden Coach made way, again, for the Glass Coach. Due to the renovation of the Binnenhof, the Speech from the Throne took place in the Koninklijke Schouwburg instead of the Ridderzaal. The Budget Memorandum, printed earlier this month, had to be supplemented with the plans that the cabinet and the energy companies had only ‘negotiated’ at the very last minute.
And the Dutch flag was upside down in some places along the royal tour.
The social discontent, which previously manifested itself in protests against nitrogen measures and against the reception of asylum seekers, was also present on Tuesday. Where normally the cheering of the orange fans dominates, there was regular whistling and booing. Protesters showed texts such as ‘The Netherlands in distress’, some turned their backs on the royal carriages or raised middle fingers. Anti-government demonstrators had also turned up on the balcony scene at Noordeinde Palace, with the king, queen and Amalia. The visible protests disrupted the image of togetherness that normally characterizes the rituals of Prinsjesdag – the orange fan who is already standing in front of the palace before dawn, people who come to The Hague from all over.
What then still binds the Dutch? Almost 80 percent no longer trust the Rutte IV cabinet, a study by I&O Research commissioned by NRC see tuesday. That is extremely low. In his speech from the throne, King Willem-Alexander mentioned it at the beginning: he called it “worrying” that the Dutch “in a mature democracy like ours lose confidence in the resolving power of politics and government”.
Don’t beg for trust
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Later in the day, Prime Minister Mark Rutte put the low confidence in perspective in a press interview. He has no intention of “begging” for it, nor did he want to “be concerned” with his own popularity. The cabinet now has to work hard to solve the purchasing power problems, Rutte believes, and hope that confidence will return. At the same time, Rutte warned that politics “cannot solve all problems” and – in the case of rising energy bills – “cannot compensate everything completely”.
However, the government is pulling out all the stops. On Tuesday, in addition to the Budget Memorandum, an emergency plan was also presented, with which the cabinet wants to reduce energy bills this year – from November – with a price ceiling. The plan costs billions of euros extra and largely meets the wishes of many opposition parties, including GroenLinks and PvdA. The opposition will demand even more money from the General Political Reflections in the coming days, but Rutte warned on Tuesday that the cabinet is already doing “a lot”. He still wants to look at additional compensation for companies.
Looking after each other, looking ahead to the future. In the eyes of many voters, VVD, D66, CDA and ChristenUnie are not yet able to live up to the motto that carries their coalition agreement. Finance Minister Sigrid Kaag (D66) said when presenting the well-known briefcase with the Budget Memorandum to the House of Representatives that the cabinet hopes to offer people “a little more certainty in this uncertain time”. But there were also words of warning in her speech. She wanted to ‘watch out for overconfident decisions’. And: “Money that we now invest in people’s livelihoods cannot go to health care, education or the purchasing power of future generations.”
At the same time, the Council of State warned that the cabinet must take extra steps to achieve the climate goals. The coalition agreement states that by 2030 greenhouse gas emissions must be 60 percent lower than in 1990. If nothing is done, the cabinet’s advisory body calculated that the reduction will be somewhere between 39 and 50 percent.
Since the beginning of Rutte IV, ministers have been working on crises that require acute solutions: on the housing market, the reception of asylum seekers, and the reduction of nitrogen emissions. And also dampening the loss of purchasing power and lowering the energy bill. The low confidence comes on top of that – or is the result of it. The question is whether the cabinet will be able to regain the confidence of the Dutch with the measures announced on Tuesday. Now dawdling again with policy for other urgent problems, such as climate, may mean that Rutte IV is preparing the next crisis of confidence itself.